One of the great insights that has served me well is, there is no truth, only perspective, and perspective is subject to change. It's always possible that what I believe today may change tomorrow. There may be new information, or an insight into what something in my past actually meant, or the realization of how distorted my perception has been. I can always learn something new, about myself and about the world, and come to see things in a whole new light. I can revise my thinking. My consciousness can expand.
When I find myself vehemently declaring I'm right, I try to remind myself that I may come to doubt the rightness of what I say. When I'm feeling blue, I remind myself that I can find another perspective on whatever is bringing me down. When someone is spouting what I judge to be drivel, I remind myself that no one, least of all me, has a lock on the truth, and this drivel-spouting someone may turn out to be someone I admire and may have something to teach me.
There is an aspect of this insight that all beliefs can change which is very disturbing to some people. If there is no Truth with a capital T, what is there to hold on to? We want an anchor, to receive the message that than create it. We want something outside ourselves that is carved in stone so we can feel safe, protected, armed with the Truth. This is why some people fight so hard against the idea of evolution. The model of existence as a slow but constant flow, as an evolution that is random and not heading toward any particular end, means that there is nothing unchanging to hold on to. Nothing is eternal. There is no solid permanent ground. If that's true, what is there to have faith in and how do we justify faith at all?
I'm going to leave those particular questions for another day. In any case, there are enough philosophers, psychologists, theologians and ethicists preoccupied with getting to the bottom of them, as if such a bottom exists. I'll just talk about my own experience. Coming to understand that all of life is an evolution, that my own life is constantly evolving has liberated me. It has given me humility because I see that I might not have enough information and it's possible I'll turn out to be wrong. It's produced empathy for another person because once I say I may not know it all, it makes me able actually to see and hear the person standing in front of me, without judgment or the need to prevail. It leads me to compassion.
Basho wrote that every day is a journey and the journey itself is home. That is the insight at the heart of so many spiritual practices. My life is movement. Experience passes through me. The meaning of my life is in how I open myself to experience and stay open to learn from it.
Returning to Basho: everyday is a journey and the journey itself is home...at home in the flow, in the constantly arising present...
All models of evolution appeal to me. Anchored in the always changing, all things contingent and in motion...
This is why people are still fighting against Darwin, against an evolutionary model. Many people want to hold to what they believe is eternal, written in stone, unchanging. The idea that everything is in motion terrifies them or at least makes them seasick; their way of being rooted (so different from mine) is to attach to what they believe is solid and predictable. Attachment to what is unchanging makes them feel safe. It's the conservative personality.
My safety is in the constantly evolving world and my place in it. Nothing is solid in my being and that is freedom - my perspective and attitudes are all liable to change, which means that I can go through the looking glass and experience black turning to white, negativity turning to optimism, fear turning to faith. Evolving consciousness means that I can awaken at any time and have the possibility of liberation.
I'm fascinated by the fact that we can have bolt-from-the-blue experiences, those that hit us with the force of revelation. (We say revelation as if the new perspective is the "real" one. but actually we can see the experience neutrally, as the exchange of one view of "reality" for another.) I'm thinking of the kind of experience that makes you clap your forehead in wonder - I was blind but now I see!
How is it that our consciousness can undergo a complete revision, see what was black yesterday as white today? Has something been building up inside, unknown and unfelt, until the tipping point is reached and we go tumbling into the new? So many wheels are turning in our consciousness that are just beyond our awareness, so much lies hidden in potential - and then the thoughts and feelings of those wheels reach the surface and we have a grand revision, or the smaller version which we call an epiphany.
We think our beliefs and thoughts are solid, tied to something eternal and unchanging, but history is full of examples of the kind of internal revolution that brings us to a new reality. Religious history is full of examples of conversions - Paul on the road to Damascus is a prime example - but there are also political awakenings, scientific revelations - and the revelations that come when you fall in love. Maybe you've known someone for a long time and barely noticed him or her. Then one day you catch sight of a certain gesture or facial expression and in an instant you're madly in love. "How could I not have seen her before?" Suddenly, the world looks different, you feel different and full of electric energy. If you were depressed before or thought things were just so-so, now you see with new eyes how beautiful the world is, full of possibility.
I'm fascinated by these experiences because they tell me how ephemeral all our thoughts and feelings are. They are always subject to revision, to change. The idea that there are no systems delivered from on high to cling to, that all of what we think is real, is actually constantly ebbing and flowing, created in our own consciousness - this idea is terrifying to many people. They see themselves floating in the void, without an anchor, alone in a cold and alien universe. But I see an anchor in the very recognition of the ephemeral nature of reality, in the realization that thoughts and beliefs are subject to change, that what I believe is true today isn't static, written in stone, but constantly unfolding, evolving, undergoing transformation. Basho, the great 17th century Japanese poet wrote, "Every day is a journey and the journey itself is home."
All is unfolding and there is always the possibility of change.
